Simple Roast Turkey
For Dinner
Published on 10/08/12
20 minutes to prepare and 180 minutes to cook
Serves 6 greedy people or 12 normal
Description
The thing is, if you are a good cook, there is no reason at all to panic about Christmas. But if you can’t cook at all, the recipe that follows is for you; it is easy and quick and won’t send you mad with having to assemble 47 ingredients just for the gravy.
Here is the simplest recipe for Roast Turkey you’ll ever find, basically you just have to sling it in the oven.
Ingredients
4 oz butter2 large onions (chopped in half)
3 or 4 cloves of garlic
1 very large 12 - 13 pound fresh or frozen and thawed turkey
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
Large pack of stuffing (choose your favourite or make your own)
6 medium carrots, peeled and cut in two length way
Coarse salt and ground black pepper
Jerk chicken seasoning
White wine (for the pot and the cook)
Brandy
Mustard
Plain flour
Instructions
Heat oven to 350 degrees F.Wash your turkey thoroughly in water with a little lemon juice. Pat it dry with a very clean tea towel. Place onions, neck, and heart of turkey in bottom of roasting pan. Make up stuffing as directed on packaging. Add stuffing to front and back cavities of turkey, but do not pack it tightly. Push the butter under skin of turkey along with garlic, massage it in well. Sprinkle turkey with salt, pepper and Jerk Chicken seasoning. Fold wing tips under bird and place turkey breast side up on top of onions. Add carrots around turkey.
Place turkey in oven. You can breathe easy for a while, but periodically check and baste. After 2 hours, add 2 small cups of water (or white wine) to the bottom of the roasting pan.
Roast about 3 hours, or until instant read thermometer in thickest part of thigh registers 170 degree F. Let rest at least 15 minutes to half an hour before carving, cover with foil and put aside, preferably out of reach of the cat .
You too should rest, get a glass of wine and sing carols.
At some point you must make gravy.
Its simple: Pour liquid from roasting pan into measuring cup. Discard onions, carrots, heart, and neck. Skim off fat from liquid and pour all but 1/4 cup back into roasting pan. For every 1/2 cup of liquid (what's in the pan and what is set aside as the reserved liquid) use 1 tablespoon flour. Stir that total amount of flour into the 1/4 cup of cooled, reserved liquid, and mix together well. Add a glug of white wine and a tiny bit of brandy to the liquid in the roasting pan and place over a medium heat. Slowly add the flour mixture to it, stirring constantly. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook 2 minutes, whisking constantly. Adjust salt and pepper to taste. Add a teaspoon of mustard to spice it up a little.
Notes
Rope the family in and get them to prep veg to accompany this seasonal classic.